Acclaimed Emmy® Award-Winning Producer Marci Klein To Produce The National Awards Ceremony of The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards

The Alliance for Young Artists & Writers announced that acclaimed television producer Marci Klein will produce the National Awards Ceremony for the 2025 Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, the longest-running, most prestigious scholarship and recognition program for creative teens in the country. Held at the Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage in New York City’s famed Carnegie Hall, the event will celebrate more than 2,500 national medalists who will travel from across the United States, U.S. territories and military bases, and Canada with their families and educators to take part in the occasion.

The National Awards Ceremony at Carnegie Hall is the much-anticipated culmination of the Awards season each year and is among the most rousing annual celebrations of teen creativity in America. The event regularly attracts some of the biggest names in entertainment and culture to celebrate the teens and honor their achievements, including Oprah Winfrey, Meryl Streep, Usher, Reese Witherspoon, Sara Bareilles, Tina Fey, Kristen Bell, Kelly Clarkson, Kathy Bates, Jennifer Garner, Tituss Burgess, Whoopi Goldberg, Sarah Jessica Parker, Glenn Close, Nick Cannon, Zac Posen, and Tim Gunn.

“I attended the National Awards Ceremony in 2022. It is like attending the Oscars for creative teens, and getting to celebrate the medalists, see the looks of joy and pride on their families’ faces, and affirm the value of their creative contributions was remarkable,” said Klein. “I knew I had to be a part of it, and I’m so grateful the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers is entrusting me with such a momentous event. Encouraging creativity, expression, and participation in the arts is more important now than ever before, and I look forward to building an event worthy of the talents of these amazing young people.”

Best known for her work on Saturday Night Live and 30 Rock, Klein is a four-time Emmy® Award winner and 14-time nominee, three-time Producers Guild Award winner and nine-time nominee, Golden Globe Award winner, and the recipient of two Peabody Awards. Since 2024, Klein has served on the board for the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers, the nonprofit administer of the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards. She has previously served as a juror for the program.

“As someone who’s spent her career uncovering some of the world’s best talent and providing them with a platform to stretch their creative abilities, I can’t think of anyone better to build an event worthy of our incredible national medalists than Marci,” said Billy DiMichele, Vice Chair of the Board of Directors for the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers and longtime Executive Producer of the National Awards Ceremony. “The National Awards Ceremony at Carnegie Hall is always the highlight of every Awards season, and all of us here at the Alliance are excited to see how Marci’s passion for this program translates into an unforgettable celebration of our nation’s creative teens.”

To help honor the national teen medalists, Klein has recruited celebrated actors Anthony Edwards, Tracy Morgan, and Amy Ryan to appear throughout the evening. Edwards and Ryan are set to open the show with a performance of five of the top recognized works of teen writing, and Morgan will be providing spoken remarks at the ceremony. Edwards is an Emmy Award-winning actor and producer best known for his work on ER, Top Gun, and Designated Survivor. Ryan has been nominated for an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and multiple Tony Awards, and is best known for her work in films and television series including Only Murders in the Building, The Office, and Gone Baby Gone. Morgan is an Emmy-nominated actor and comedian best known for his work on Saturday Night Live and 30 Rock.

Since its founding in 1923, the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards have provided a platform for generations of creative teenagers to create groundbreaking work that reflects their points of view and unique experiences, their communities, their passions, their fears, and their hopes for the future. Alumni of the program include some of our nation’s most celebrated luminaries, including Robert Redford, Silvia Plath, Richard Avedon, Truman Capote, Charles White, Ken Burns, Stephen King, John Updike, Richard Linklater, Kay WalkingStick, Tracy Reese, Robert Indiana, Joyce Carol Oates, Philip Pearlstein, Andy Warhol, and Amanda Gorman. This year, nearly 110,000 teens participated in the Awards, entering more than 310,000 works for adjudication. Of the works entered, nearly 90,000 regional awards were presented to nearly 50,000 teens, and more than 2,800 works received National Medals.

About the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers and The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards

The Alliance for Young Artists & Writers is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that provides guidance, recognition, and support for the next generation of artists and writers, and the platforms for showcasing their work to a national audience. The Alliance administers The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, a program that provides teens with opportunities for celebration, exhibition, publication, and scholarships. Annually, more than 100,000 teens across the United States and Canada enter original works in 28 different categories of art and writing. Beyond The Awards, the Alliance produces a number of programs to support creative teens and their educators, including the National Student Poets Program, a national exhibition program, Summer Scholarships program, residencies for educators, and professional development and microgrant programs for Awards alumni to pursue their creative endeavors.

For more information about the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers, made possible through the generosity of numerous individual, foundation, government, and corporate funders, visit www.artandwriting.org. Additional details about the Awards can be found on the Scholastic Newsroom: www.scholastic.com/newsroom/online-press-kits/scholastic-art-writing-awards.html. 

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